Movie Reviews

Not Your Usual Rom-Com

Ana Mardoll | United States | 04/30/2009

(4 out of 5 stars)

"100 Girls / B0014D5PO8

*Spoilers*

Though I don't usually go for romantic comedies, "100 Girls" is a standby favorite of mine. When Matt is trapped in an elevator during a power outage with a girl whose face he didn't see (obscured by a large load of laundry she was taking to the dorm laundry room), he finds that the anonymity of darkness allows him to overcome his shyness and actually talk to the other girl, rather than his usual response of being stunned into tongue-tied silence. Several meaningful conversations later, they share an incredible sexual interlude in the dark elevator, and Matt wakes the next morning hopelessly in love...and no idea as to the identify of his 'mystery girl'.

So begins his quest: Matt has one semester to figure out which of the 100 girls in the dorm in question is the woman of his dreams.

Matt tries several terrible attempts to figure out the identity of his dream girl via logic and reason - including an ill-fated attempt to find the matching undies to the pair that was left behind in the elevator - when he finally comes to understand that in order to find the answer, he actually has to get to know these girls. Intimately, as a friend. And as Matt explores these new friendships, he comes to understand more about women, more about himself, and more about gender relations than he ever imagined.

I love this movie because each of the characters starts out as a movie stereotype and ends - as Matt comes to understand them - as a wonderful, complete human being. The gorgeous goddess who has every man writing in her palm secretly worries that no one will ever take her seriously because it will always be assumed that she had help with her homework. The ugly smart girl who spends every evening reading alone in the library comes to realize that she is beautiful and sexy, despite a lifetime of feeling otherwise. The sporty girl who never wears makeup and has five brothers and no sisters just wants to be treated seriously as a human being, and not shoved into a category. The perfect "girl next door" obsesses that her strict mother won't accept her for who she really is. For each and every girl in the dorm, Matt realizes that they are human beings - like him - and that, like him, they each have individual hopes, dreams, fears, and secrets. And, like him, they find romantic entanglements to be just as scary and fraught with peril as he. In a world where Hollywood tosses out gender-stereotyped Rom-Coms daily, "100 Girls" is a rare find indeed.

This movie has closed captions for the hearing impaired."

4.5

Riley H | WI, USA | 10/31/2009

(4 out of 5 stars)

"I really like this movie! Its one of those randoms were you could watch it with a mixed group of friends there is the dumb comedy and the sweet romance right along with plan straight up funny! I (20years old) watched it with my brother (22years old), his friends (21-23ish) and my cuz from PA, she is (18ish I think?) and the conservative neighbor boy who is a freshman in collage and my mom who is like 50 and it had us all laughing! and the group enjoyed it no one really complained ...witch is rare :)"